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Jurassic World just passed The Avengers to become the third highest grossing domestic and international hit of all time. When you adjust it for inflation it drops to number 27, which is still impressive, considering. This means not only did millions of people want to see it, but once they saw it they liked it enough to not only see it again but recommend it to millions of their friends. Doesn’t that count for something in the world of naming the “Best Picture of the year”? The answer to that is, no, it doesn’t count for anything beyond the disproportionately tiny visual effects category. Sound, Sound mixing. Art direction on occasion. Titanic and Avatar hold the the number one and number two spots, but what made them Best Picture juggernauts was their serious side, their emotional effectiveness.. Still, it is getting harder and harder to ignore the “new normal” of Hollywood when it comes to the Best Picture race.

Last year was probably the most dramatic disconnect between the films real people saw vs. films the Oscar voters saw and voted on. The only movie the majority of Americans could really talk about was American Sniper because so many had already seen the film by the time the awards rolled around. How do you build a movie like American Sniper? You consider both the audience and the Oscars, meaning it’s a prestige pic made by a studio set for wide release with big name celebrities. Studios put these movies out every year but only some of them are deemed worthy by critics and then by the industry. By no means does the industry take the public into account anymore. The ticket buyers do not influence voters. At the same time, voters are still a consensus, albeit a slightly upscale consensus compared to, say, the People’s Choice Awards. These are ostensibly industry professionals who believe they are choosing the best films they saw in a given season.

As far as blockbusters go, Jurassic World is popular for a reason. Part of its appeal, no doubt, is the spectacle left over from Spielberg’s 1993 Jurassic Park. The same way the new Star Wars movie (and the Star Trek movie before it) is supposed to wipe clean the bad memories of the bad sequels, this Jurassic Park was being billed as a “return to form,” meaning, the same park, with more focus on characters. In this version, the dinos have been genetically altered to be bigger and meaner and scarier. Audiences interpret that as spectacle of the kind they have never seen before.

The other appealing things about Jurassic World include its alluring male lead, Chris Pratt, who has gained a massive following of young girls since Guardians of the Galaxy. Pre-awareness + spectacle + appealing lead would be enough for a major hit. For it rise to the top three there must be something more. That “more” is that it’s a pretty good popcorn movie with an engaging group of creatures you feel for. It also has an eco message that is clearly anti-SeaWorld, anti-animal captivity.

In one way, you can look at Jurassic World and its ilk as the ruiner of all good things, movie-wise. That it is what movies will be in the future, as George Lucas once predicted — tent poles, event movies that play everywhere in the world and make more money than anyone could ever dream of because they stick to the formula: leading male saves the day, massive previously unseen visual effects, humor. It would be easy to call the film sexist but in fact it’s actually worse than that: it’s misogynist in a casual way, meaning none of the women in the film understand anything important, and more than one woman seems to have been invited to serve the sole purpose of gory dino-bait. This is a major leap from the first film where Spielberg not only cast Laura Dern as one of the smartest scientists but he also cast a young female teen/computer whiz to save the day. In the update, the kids are made into two boys. The highly placed executive played by Bryce Dallas Howard is mansplained about the dinosaurs every step of the way. She doesn’t even know the basics of what they are and even worse, the script makes her do the world’s most stupid thing: run from a T-Rex in high heels.

Because my personal commitment to animal welfare supersedes my irritation with the film’s misogyny, I was willing to give Jurassic World a pass and even paid to see the movie twice. This formula works all over the world because misogyny thrives all over the world — in fact, it’s the default position. When you look at the top moneymakers internationally they are all male-driven visual effects movies. In other words, audiences aren’t necessarily looking for feminist heroes or stunt casting. They want the formula. If you give it to them, they will come.

Because of its inherent and obvious sexist ways, Jurassic World doesn’t deserve to be nominated as the best film of the year, although it wouldn’t be the first nor the last Best Picture nominee to be blatantly sexist. Just look at last year. The only difference is that in the prestige pics they make the supporting females a wee bit smarter than Bryce Dallas Howard.

Still, I can’t be the only one who is looking at the long game here, where it’s all headed and what might eventually be the answer. The Academy is going to have to find a way to answer to the changing landscape of film. Either they will need a separate category for effects-driven films or else they will need a separate tech category to honor the evolving visuals. A publicist friend suggested there being two categories — one for visual effects and one for special effects. I’m no expert but I would think anything to expand where they are now would be a step in the right direction for them.

Why do I think the Oscars need to evolve? They will be closing in on their 100th birthday in a decade and a half. In the year 2025 what will movies look like? What will the “Oscar movies” look like? Will they be strictly independents? Will they be films made in other countries where they value their artists over profits? Will the studios continue to care about winning Oscars — so much so that they lay those select eggs every year?

I don’t have the answer and to tell you the truth, I probably won’t be writing about the Oscars then. It does seem, however, like the film industry — at least the American film industry =– is only moving in one direction. Perhaps things will shift back as the millennials age a bit. Either way, if Jurassic World beats Titanic to become number 2, what then? Can it beat Avatar? Will any movie ever beat Avatar and if so, would it be deserving of being named Best Picture of the Year? We’ll have to wait and see.

Los Angeles, CA, July 23, 2015 – Bob Gazzale, President and CEO of the American Film Institute, issued the following statement in response to the tragic event in Lafayette, Louisiana.

“Going to a summer movie is a celebration of the American creative spirit and one of our nation’s most beloved pastimes. Let us stand together in these times of tragedy and embrace what is precious to us — churches, schools and places where the arts can send our spirits soaring. As a national community of artists and audiences, AFI offers our heartfelt sympathies to the victims in Louisiana and their families.”

Robin Williams would have been 64 years old today. After we lost him 11 months ago, Daniel Smith-Rowsey wrote a magnificent tribute and has graciously allowed us to re-post it today — a celebration of the life of a consummate performer, “often imitated but never equaled; no one could quite be him.”

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Every reputable university offers a film class where students learn about Charlie Chaplin. Robert Sklar wrote that Chaplin’s comic persona “succeeded far beyond any other figure in the history of twentieth-century media.” At least six weighty textbooks hail Chaplin’s exquisite blend of comedy and pathos, but contemporary students usually prefer Chaplin’s peer Buster Keaton. As Louis Giannetti and Scott Eyman put it, Keaton’s “dry, sardonic, analytically abstract humor is much more in tune with modern sensibilities.”

Robin Williams was our Charlie Chaplin. With his tight lips and serene, unflappable posture, Bill Murray is probably the modern Buster Keaton, and the cool thing to do is follow in his wake – that’s why there are T-shirts of him everywhere. Still, most comedians who become movie stars aren’t quite Murray or Williams; instead they play a lot of blowhards who need comeuppances. Think of almost anyone from 40 years of Saturday Night Live; wise guys, class clowns, overgrown adolescents. The nature of feature filmmaking dictates that Hollywood must ask lead comedians to pivot in the third act to admit their faults – think of Eddie Murphy, Chevy Chase, Steve Martin, Billy Crystal, Jim Carrey, Will Ferrell, Steve Carell, Ben Stiller, Chris Rock. Sometimes the pivot works, more often it doesn’t.

When Robin Williams was asked to pivot, it worked. More often, as with Chaplin, the other characters had to pivot to him. He could be desperately, almost anarchically funny for most of a film’s running time, and then he would bring on the sentiment, with those world-weary eyes and shoulders. For a comedian, Williams was rarely very wrong in narratives. Because his moral rectitude wasn’t as closely tied to Chaplin’s onscreen sympathy for the underprivileged, critics began to see Williams as cloying or “treacly” (per A.O. Scott). Audiences regarded him a little better than critics: between 1987 and 1998, ten films starring Williams each made more than $90 million (in non-adjusted dollars) at the domestic box office, more than anyone else at the time, including Tom Hanks and Tom Cruise. But Williams was never cool, like Murray or Murphy or Rock. There weren’t T-shirts.

Jerry Seinfeld said, “The comedian studies himself; the actor studies other people. The comedian wants to be himself; the actor wants to be anyone else.” When most SNL-level comedians become actors, they play a sort of toned-down version of themselves, because that’s what they assume we’ve come for. But Williams and Chaplin were unusual in being natural comedians and actors, intuitively funny and empathic. They loved people on a deep, unfakeable level as much as they loved themselves. When we laughed with them, it felt earned; when their lips quavered to cry, it felt real. Their famous liberal and anti-poverty campaigning (Williams through groups like Comic Relief) grew organically out of their genuine concern as manifested onscreen.

Remembering Williams, President Obama said, “He made us laugh. He made us cry. He gave his immeasurable talent freely and generously to those who needed it most — from our troops stationed abroad to the marginalized on our own streets. The Obama family offers our condolences to Robin’s family, his friends, and everyone who found their voice and their verse thanks to Robin Williams.” Similar statements were heard after the death of Charlie Chaplin – and very few other people. If Chaplin had only done the acting, or the directing, or the activism, we would still remember him; if Williams had only done the improv comedy, or the screen career, or the activism, we would still remember him.

Chaplin and Williams both became famous because of a self-inspired bits of physical comedy; Chaplin invented the Little Tramp mannerisms while improvising a short called Kid’s Auto Race in 1914; 63 years later, ABC asked an auditioning Williams to sit on the couch like an alien, so he sat on his head. Neither man had a problem getting in drag if the situation called for it. In some ways, you could argue that Williams surpassed Chaplin; certainly the thousands of little character gesticulations and verbal jokes (personally, I always loved “If you can remember the sixties, you must not have been there”) were probably as difficult to produce as the best mime.

No TV star ever had a better transition to movies than Robin Williams. No comedian besides Chaplin ever was trusted with more heart. Robin Williams became the model for the George Clooneys as well as the Jim Carreys. He was often imitated but never equaled; no one could quite be him. Amid all the eulogies to what a universally nice person he was, I haven’t seen anyone else recall that Williams ran to Christopher Reeve’s bedside to bring him laughter at the worst possible time. Years later, shortly after 9/11, he did something similar when he revived his stand-up for New York City – not something a lot of Oscar winners would have bothered with. As a liberal and a performer, Williams gave and gave and gave and gave. And then, something gave.

Like Chaplin, Williams battled demons throughout his adult life that were mostly of his own making. Chaplin was a cautionary tale for his times: he was too interested in socialist politics, teenage girls, and obsolete technology. Williams, if the morning-after encomiums are any guide, is a cautionary tale for his: depression is real and we must help our depressed friends to get help and stay helped. One of my friends wrote that she always sensed his inability to eschew his “raw exposure to the thoughts and emotions of those around him.” How lucky we were, then, that he morphed that painful empathy into such beauty for so long.

We know Charlie Chaplin’s contributions to film history; as David Robinson put it in The Oxford History of World Cinema, he “contributed much to Hollywood’s prosperity and rise to worldwide pre-eminence in the period of the First World War. The sophisticated intelligence and skills he brought to slapstick comedy forced intellectuals to recognize that art could reside in a wholly popular entertainment.” What does Robin Williams’ passage in textbooks look like? Well…it doesn’t. The powerful play of life has gone on and Williams has been allowed to write a verse…but the books haven’t included it. So let’s look at a first draft of that puppy, shall we?

As the alien-on-Earth Mork on Mork and Mindy, Williams was part of the heyday of the ABC sitcom, a time that included Happy Days, Laverne and Shirley, and Three’s Company. More generally, he was a keystone to the peak of the multi-camera sitcom era of the 70s and 80s, a group that included All in the Family, The Mary Tyler Moore Show, The Jeffersons, M*A*S*H, Cheers, and The Cosby Show. As with the best episodes of those shows, Williams’ work as Mork adroitly alternated between laughs and pathos. Yet every week he brought something a bit unlike the rest of TV, twenty minutes of motor-mouth voracious-intellectual incredibly-funny restlessness followed by two minutes of soulfulness and vulnerability that really couldn’t be, and wasn’t, faked. If we count Mork and Mindy as science-fiction, then thanks to Williams the show was probably both the funniest and warmest science-fiction show of all time.

As a stand-up comedian and occasional event host, Williams was a little bit of everything: topical, physical, situational, metaphorical, kitschy, folksy, strident, sexual. Most comedians need a moment to work toward a given character; Williams reeled off accents, voices, squeaky noises and imitations without taking breaths in between. As the New York Times put it, he was an improvisational genius who was forever in the moment, an “explosively, exhaustingly, prodigiously verbal comedian,” a fast mouth with a faster mind, and an irrepressible character who also made himself a terrific character actor.

In a two-year period from 1986 to 1988, many filmmakers explored the Vietnam War, including Oliver Stone, Stanley Kubrick, and Brian DePalma, but America’s and the world’s favorite depiction was Barry Levinson’s Good Morning Vietnam (1987), starring Williams as an uproarious, anti-army army DJ. (Because the film’s sympathetic co-stars are black and Asian, the film prefigured the polyglot racial casts that would become de rigeur by the 00’s.) Though Williams had already headlined well-received dramas, GMV was a star-making film for him, his first to earn more than $100m at the U.S. box office, and the first to earn him an Oscar nomination. Had GMV not come out, that nomination might well have gone to Williams’ friend and then-co-star of a stage version of Waiting for Godot, Steve Martin, for his sublime work in Roxanne; as it happened, Martin never came close to another nomination, while Williams’ laurel earned him better scripts and A-list status. Williams’ trademark manic energy was now just one card he could deploy; audiences showed they also liked him when he was serious.

As the pluperfect teacher-inspirer John Keating in Peter Weir’s Dead Poets Society (1989), as the brilliant, sad neurologist-psychologist Oliver Sacks in Penny Marshall’s Awakenings (1990), as the grown-up, seen-it-all Peter (Pan) Banning in Steven Spielberg’s Hook (1991), and as the deluded homeless Grail-seeker Parry in Terry Gilliam’s The Fisher King (1991), Williams, along with Kevin Costner, helped to spearhead a new kind of sensitive male star-actor for the 1990s. This new sort of baby boomer avatar tended not to use guns; as a liberal after Reagan, he instead bared his soul to solve problems. Tom Hanks – a man who is more often mentioned in film history textbooks – tended to follow in Williams’ wake, first by jumping from a medium-rated sitcom to movies, then by peppering comedy roles with drama, then by taking on juicier parts, then by voicing Disney features.

Though jazz musicians starred in The Jungle Book (1967), most voice talent in feature cartoons was anonymous prior to Aladdin (1992), which conspicuously featured Robin Williams as a madcap genie. Many actors who had built careers out of anonymous animation work came to resent Williams’ brilliant work, or more accurately Disney’s Jeffrey Katzenberg for thinking to hire Williams in the first place. The implied metaphor of a genie being irreversibly out of a bottle was almost too apt. More happily for the rest of us, there was no returning Williams’ career to a lamp. The genie character, like his eponymous role in Mrs. Doubtfire (1993), seemed tailor-made to his persona, because as an actor, he generally played sincerity and weakness. However, unlike many, he could also be suddenly insincere or strong without ever being less than convincing.

As one of the 1990s’ top stars, Williams did a little of everything. He played leads and supporting roles; he did big-budget and low-budget; he made good films and bad ones; he helped keep San Francisco alive as a film location; he helped the cause of mainstream gay representation by starring in The Birdcage (1996), which probably wouldn’t have become a massive hit without him; he lent his persona to technological-breakthrough films like Jumanji (1995), Flubber (1997) and What Dreams May Come (1998); he enabled younger talent to become stars, like Ethan Hawke, Mara Wilson, Matt Damon, and Ben Affleck; and he won an Oscar on his fourth nomination, as the embittered widower Dr. Sean Maguire in Good Will Hunting (1997). In the 2000s, he was no longer at the top of the A-list, but he could still show up and make things a lot more interesting, as in Insomnia (2002), One Hour Photo (2002), Robots (2005), and the Happy Feet and Night at the Museum franchises. Despite numerous opportunities, he never directed a film or did much with his own production company; it seemed that he preferred to be everyone’s favorite gun for hire, the one who could arrive on the set and make everyone feel better. By all accounts, he did.

On a personal level, I loved him like he was a favorite uncle. The name “Mork from Ork,” the suspenders, and the polyvalent shirts made it easy for kids to buy in, but we stayed because of raw talent and generosity of spirit. The fact that he was a fellow Bay Arean didn’t hurt; I felt I could aspire to be him. My single, working mother and I bonded over watching his shows and his comedy specials together. We ran out to see both Popeye and The World According to Garp. This will sound preposterous to modern kids, but those came out when I was 9 and 11, and they were two of the first ten films I ever saw. I remember that I loved Garp more; maybe it was all the sex-change discussion. When I learned that Williams had died, I popped in my DVD of the 2002 HBO special again, and I was laughing too hard to cry…until the very end, when he waved as the audience leapt to its feet in a standing ovation. Can you blame us for wanting more?

Charlie Chaplin died on Christmas Day in 1977; is it mere coincidence that Mork and Mindy emerged from its eggshell nine months later? Well, of course it is. Nonetheless, the ultimate measure of Chaplin’s and Williams’ lives is the same: amount of lives improved, new smiles brought, situations understood and sympathized with. These cannot be counted, but we know that they are in the hundreds of millions. At best, most comedians’ eyes are the window to their own souls; Chaplin’s and Williams’ eyes were windows onto more people than that. The eminent film historian David Cook wrote that Chaplin’s Little Tramp character “became a kind of universal cinematic symbol for our common humanity.” So did Robin Williams.

Once you get thrown over for one of your best performances for a younger actress in one of her not-so-best performances you get to a stage where you have nothing to lose. I love it when women reach this stage — I’m there now — because you don’t have to make bargains to shut up anymore. Hollywood Reporter points us to this interview with Emma Thompson where she minces no words to explain how bad things STILL are, despite it being such a successful summer for women.

“I don’t think there’s any appreciable improvement, and I think that, for women, the question of how they are supposed to look is worse than it was even when I was young. So no, I am not impressed, at all. I think it’s still completely shit, actually.

“When I was younger, I really did think we were on our way to a better world. And when I look at it now, it is in a worse state than I have known it, particularly for women, and I find that very disturbing and sad.

“So I get behind as many young female performers as I can, and actually a lot of the conversations with them are about exactly the fact that we are facing and writing about the same things and nothing has changed, and that some forms of sexism and unpleasantness to women have become more entrenched and indeed more prevalent.”

Here is the problem as I see it. The market is driven by (or perceived to be driven by) young boys and middle-aged men / middle-aged childmen who have been conditioned for decades, and really from birth, to believe films are supposed to be about only male characters. Marketing drives and enforces this lie. It is especially bad in the Oscar race because it doesn’t appear that films are even conceived or envisioned with women in the leads. It’s as though what happens to women in life has zero importance compared to the more important lives of men and boys. Men and boys are the center of the universe in animation and superhero movies — schlubby losers always win the day — and they are the center of the universe in Big Oscar Movies (broken man saves the day or valiantly tries and fails).

To make matters worse, when the Academy has the opportunity to reward a woman their feet get tangled in that mass of “I don’t want to reward her JUST BECAUSE she’s a woman.” Emma Thompson in Saving Mr. Banks gets tossed for Amy Adams in American Hustle. Did Thompson really deserve to take a dive for that just because of the real story controversy? Gillian Flynn is dumped for Damien Chazelle. Ava DuVernay is passed over for yet another white guy. Opportunities to help level the playing field are being wasted while the white male paradigm continues to be reinforced and celebrated with each new movie deal that gets announced.

Things are changing, though. How much or how far is unclear. I have faith in the millennials because they really do not stand for the same old shit. They have money to burn and they will be the future ticket buyers. Hollywood only has to listen carefully to that distant thunder. To be frittering away opportunities for an actress and writer of Emma Thompson’s caliber is immoral. Invest in actresses who are getting better as they get older. They should not be shelved but instead challenged. People will come, Ray. Oh yes, people will come.

Gold Derby was one of the last remaining independent awards sites and now, they announce, no more. They will be owned by Penske media group — who also own Deadline and Variety. This is a huge get for Tom, whose goal was to sell the site to be able to maintain it:

After 15 years of intense jockeying, sprinting and occasional spills, Gold Derby has finally reached an impressive finish line – we’ve been acquired by Penske Media Corporation. That’s the equivalent to winning the Kentucky Derby. Or, better, it’s like winning the Oscar.

It’s tough to run a site on one’s own. Jeff Wells, David Poland, Nathaniel Rogers and I are really the last independents left of those who built it way back when. AwardDaily (then Oscarwatch) was a solo site back when Gold Derby joined the LA Times and remains a solo site today, 16 years after launching back in 1999. Anne Thompson is at the much bigger Indiewire, Kris Tapley was at Hitix but we’re still waiting on news where In Contention will land. Scott Feinberg works at The Hollywood Reporter. Many more awards sites have sprung in our wake like Rope of Silicon, AwardsCircuit and AwardsWatch not to mention scads of others. Awards sites keep coming and going and going and coming and always too soon!

With this sale, Gold Derby can become a thing that can survive beyond Tom’s own participation, which means he can take a break someday, if he wants. It also means he doesn’t have to sweat the ad sales, which is the hardest part of this job without a doubt. He can concentrate more on content without having to hustle up the cash. It’s good news for Tom and Gold Derby and I know he’ll be happy about it. As for us, we’re not sure what the future holds for AwardsDaily. We just know that we’re still here.

The BBC have unveiled their list of the 100 greatest American Films of all time. The BBC polled 62 critics from around the world to compile the list that includes Hitchcock’s Vertigo and Psycho. Spielberg, Francis Ford Coppola and Martin Scorsese all feature in the list. 12 Years a Slave is the most recent film to make the list at #99 and the oldest film is 1915’s Birth of a Nation.

So, what do the BBC regard as the greatest American Film of all time? Citizen Kane by Orson Welles. Coppola’s The Godfather takes the second slot and rounding out the top three is Alfred Hitchcock’s Vertigo.

Eight years ago, progressives and liberals rallied behind an eloquent first-term senator who called himself a “skinny guy with a funny name.” Barack Obama won hearts and united the left like never before. He was to be our first black president and would succeed in rescuing the country from eight disastrous years under President George W. Bush. Bush had been selected by Florida’s Secretary of State (under the then governor, Jeb Bush, W’s brother) and a 5-4 decision from our conservative Supreme Court. Al Gore had won the popular vote but they handed it to Bush. We went to war with Iraq and Afghanistan, a catastrophic vendetta disguised as retribution for 9/11. Wall Street collapsed under the weight of greed and lack of Federal regulation. The economy tanked 5 months before Bush slipped out the back exit. Things could not have gotten much worse for Americans who had become accustomed to a well oiled empire. Obama came in to take the country in a different direction, or so the narrative went anyway. Obama’s supporters came from far and wide, from all sides of the liberal spectrum. He had the African-American vote, no question. He had the moderate liberal vote. He fired up the progressives, who seemed to believe he could single-handedly do things that no president can ever actually do in office. No one expected President Obama would have to confront the most hostile Congress in US history. That hostility created continual roadblocks to his platform of hope, change and reform. Obama had to act outside Congress on many things, thus got called a tyrant and a fascist. They called him a liar during his State of the Union Address. By the end of his second term our American government would consist of a Democrat in the White House in lone opposition to a Republican Congress and Republican-leaning Supreme Court.

With the Supreme Court finally making gay marriage legal, and trying to finally convince stubborn Republicans that the Affordable Care Act is here to stay, there is much upset on the conservative side of our country. So much so that the GOP are brewing a perfect storm for an all-out takeover of the U.S. government, with plans to take the presidency, Congress and the Supreme Court. With that kind of alignment of power they could finally enact all the legislation Obama has stopped them from jamming through. That Presidential VETO vote has been gold these past few years. Historically, two consecutive terms of a Democrat in the White is usually followed by a Republican president in office. That’s largely because the eligible voters who sit out elections every year (a staggering number) begin to feel angry enough to go to the polls to unseat the powers that be.

The Democrats have a formidable frontrunner in Hillary Clinton. She would be, at last, the first female president. She is still polling with higher support than anyone else in the race, Democrat or Republican. But now come the laments of respected trendsetters like Bill Maher on HBO, and more dubious armchair quarterbacks like Jeff Wells at Hollywood Elsewhere. Publicly they claim that they just don’t feel excited about Hillary — and privately they know if her nomination at the Democratic Convention is accepted as a done deal it will never drive conversations, TV panel disputes, site traffic, heated debate or ad money. As answer to their prayers to see a dramatic hero/villain scenario set in motion, Bernie Sanders came along, a good man and self-proclaimed socialist who can boast that he isn’t taking PAC money but is raising his campaign cash the old-fashioned way, with thousands of grassroots donors. Never mind that Hillary has enormous grass-roots support of her own in addition to impressive funding from essential major players. Bernie has positioned himself as the anti-Hillary.

All at once, loud voices on left have begun to attack their own party, with eager assistance from GOP operatives who’ve been continually feeding negative stories about Hillary through leftist Twitter accounts for months, according to the New York Times. Many complacent liberals have taken the bait, hook, line and sinker. Now we not only have Bernie Sanders supporters — we have Hillary Clinton haters on the left to do finish the hatchet job Republicans have been orchestrating ever since they tried to make Benghazi stick. That accomplishes two things. It helps to disillusion less-devoted Democrats, to ensure fewer votes for Hillary Clinton come election time, and it makes the Republicans look good because they can point to wobbly Democrat pundits. The Republican saboteurs no longer have to get their hands dirty trying to ruin her chances because the Democrats are doing it for them. And there is no stopping it now. A barrage of traffic-generating thinky-pieces on Salon, Huffington Post, DailyKos, Matt Taibbi are seeding the discontent, firmly in the Sanders camp, trying to get him, and not Hillary, the nomination next summer.

But those Republicans, they are just getting started. Obama has spent two exhausting terms defending himself against accusations that he was a closet socialist. Now there is a proud self-confessed socialist actually running? This is the GOP’s wet dream. It’s manna from heaven and they know it. Bernie Sanders will need to raise taxes to pay for his elaborate raft of programs and he naturally wants to raise them on the rich. While I personally think is a beautiful thing, because who with any sense of humanity wouldn’t, we all know how most Americans respond to that kind of talk. They hear “taxes” and they assume Democrats want half of everybody’s paycheck to pay for silly things like infrastructure. So yeah, do the math. Not a pretty picture. As John Steinbeck said, “Socialism never took root in America because the poor see themselves not as an exploited proletariat but as temporarily embarrassed millionaires.”

Though, in my worst nightmares, I fear we can pretty much stick a fork in it for Democrats this election cycle — divided we fall — there is hope on the horizon. Young people are fired up for Bernie Sanders, which could mean that further down the road someone as revolutionary as Bernie, might really get elected. No one wants to put a damper the involvement of young voters or their kill their spirit, so cynics like me will have to just hide out in our dark corners and wait for it all to be over. Even though deep down I’m thinking: Please don’t risk another conservative being appointed to the Supreme Court, please don’t let a climate change denier take control of the White House. I personally will fight for whomever gets the nomination but more and more I hear fervent liberals say they will only vote for Bernie Sanders and not for Hillary Clinton. I want to believe that devotion will shift once the dust settles and sensible people weigh the Clinton Dynasty against the Bush Dynasty. But for now, it’s a discouraging and nerve-racking situation. Nicely done, GOP. Nicely done.

Meanwhile, let’s look at how all of this — human nature, voting and campaigning — resembles familiar patterns in the Oscar race.

Early campaigning, candidates announcing = Film Festivals

The same way the presidential race feeds on the manufactured drama of divisive heroes and villains, so does the Oscar race for Best Picture. In 2012, 12 Years a Slave landed with thunderous acclaim in Telluride, was heralded as the de facto Best Picture winner, preordained as it were. That set into motion a divisive awards race that pit Gravity (a billion dollar juggernaut somehow morphed into the scrappy underdog) against 12 Years a Slave (the mean ol’ frontrunner who must be defeated). The pre-nominations phase offers up many opportunities for potential winners. Each film has its own lobbyist, an awards strategist who dutifully works the press, the blogs, twitter, doing damage control. As soon a film seems like a potentially viable contender a really good strategist is attached to it.

From this point, it is a matter of how each option plays in the real world. How did Hillary Clinton play in New Hampshire? How did Bernie Sanders play in Iowa? How did Jeb! Bush play in Texas? How did The Artist play in the Toronto? How did Birdman play at that Academy screening? How did The Wolf of Wall Street play at a special DGA screening? The process is the same.

It is all sunshine and roses until one film is positioned as the winner and one film the underdog. That’s when fickle public opinion can begin to shift.

Campaigning and fundraising – you pay to play with politics and the Oscars.

One of Hillary most potent advantages, like Obama’s last two terms, is her ability to fund-raise amid corruptive forces in the era of Super-PACs. Jeb Bush racked up $100 million in donations before he even announced the official launch of his campaign, exploiting a loophole in the Citizens United decision that says money counts as speech and is therefore covered under the 1st Amendment. Meanwhile, the deep-pocketed Koch brothers are backing Scott Walker who is now polling ahead in Iowa. Needless to say, the GOP have their guys more than covered. Seems every billionaire in America is ready to adopt his very own pet Republican candidate. They won’t be outspent by anyone except maybe Hillary Clinton. With the help of Bill Clinton and perhaps Big Hollywood, Clinton is the only Democrat on the horizon who’s able to compete with those guys — except for the fact that many the left are being fed the nonsense that any big money must be “dirty money.” Obama assembled the same sources of funding, but somehow he was cheered on while Hillary is seen as a MEAN OLD CORPORATE STOOGE for raising lots of fuck-you money.

This is similar to the charges leveled against The Social Network’s ad campaign vs. The King’s Speech in 2010. Somehow, someone got it out there that Sony was spending record amounts of money on the Social Network so that it was insinuated they were trying “to buy” a Best Picture victory. The same thing happened to Lincoln in 2012. As someone who is often the recipient of FYC money I can tell you that it’s really hard to win Best Picture, or even get an Oscar nomination at all, if you don’t pay to play.

The amount of money it costs to launch either a presidential campaign or an Oscar campaign often helps clarify one’s intentions, and by any sane evaluation monetary support should be a measure of confidence. Studios and distributors have to ask themselves do they really want to spent that money? Do they want or need to demonstrate loyalty to their talent? For what reason? To what end? What is in it for them? Likewise, in politics, there is a sense that everyone has a right and a responsibility to get involved in remaking our country with candidates of our own choosing lifted aloft with our own money. Everybody raises it, everybody spends it, but it still comes down to perception. Good guys vs. bad guys (and girls).

Bernie Sanders just sent out an email that reads:

Yesterday afternoon, Jeb Bush announced that a relatively small number of wealthy donors have contributed over one hundred million dollars to his Super PAC.
This is not a democracy. This is oligarchy.
Unfortunately, Jeb Bush is not alone. Almost all of our opponents have embraced this model of fundraising — begging billionaire benefactors who have bought up the private sector to try their hand at buying a presidential election.
One of those Super PACs is already running ads against our campaign.
Let me be clear: I am more than aware our opponents will outspend us, but we are going to win this election. They have the money, but we have the people.

This, before asking for another donation. In the months and days counting down to the election, anyone who’s ever visited a political site will have his or her inbox bombarded with emails asking for money. I’ve already donated, but they will keep asking and asking and asking and begging and begging and begging. Everyone will want something in return. It’s an illusion to think that only corporations are involved. So why do they need so much money? For advertising, of course.

I learned a hard lesson last year when Gone Girl did no advertising for the Oscar race. There was maybe one ad for Rosamund Pike I saw. Without advertising you can’t get nominations. You need to show voters that you want it, and you need to remind them that you’re out there — they need to remember the movie.

In politics, ads shape the message — here is a breakdown of where the money went in 2012. Obama spent $57 million in June to Romney’s $27 million. Of that, Romney only used $39 million for media buys to Obama’s $67 million. You can see that money drives everything. In politics, as with the Oscars.

As we can see by the way liberals are positioning Clinton this year, no one wants to be on the side of corporate money. That’s perception. Maybe Bernie Sanders really is the scrappy underdog that could. He still needs to raise lots and lots of money and without PACS or billionaire patrons he simply can’t compete with Bush or Walker.

Smear Campaigns — works for politics, works for Oscars

One of Hillary Clinton’s best hands to play at this table is that there isn’t much more people can dredge up about her past that hasn’t already been laid out there. She’s still standing. The latest accusation against her was the kerfuffle over private emails, and before that the one word accusation lobbed at her by many people who probably have no idea what it even means: BENGHAZI. Note: As of May 29, 2012, according to the U.S. Department of Defense casualty website, there were 4,425 total deaths (including both killed in action and non-hostile) and 32,223 wounded in action (WIA) as a result of Operation Iraqi Freedom. How many Americans were killed during the terrorist attacks in Benghazi? 4.

Why try to turn the left against the left? The GOP learned the strategy from the 2012 election:

Conservative strategists and operatives say they are simply filling a vacuum on the far left, as well as applying the lesson they learned in 2012, when they watched in frustration as Mitt Romney was forced to expend time and resources in a protracted primary fight. By the time he secured his party’s nomination, President Obama hardly had to make the case that his opponent was a cold-hearted plutocrat; Republicans like Newt Gingrich had already made the argument for him in the primaries.

Few Republicans are more familiar with that nightmare than Matt Rhoades, who was Mr. Romney’s campaign manager. He founded America Rising in response to a recommendation contained in an autopsy of Romney’s failed presidential run that was ordered by the Republican National Committee. The group’s original goal was to compete with American Bridge, the Democratic opposition research group, but its focus under Mr. Rhoades has been to subject Mrs. Clinton to an ordeal similar to Mr. Romney’s.

“The idea is to make her life difficult in the primary and challenge her from the left,” said Colin Reed, America Rising’s executive director. “We don’t want her to enter the general election not having been pushed from the left, so if we have opportunities — creative ways, especially online — to push her from the left, we’ll do it just to show those folks who she needs to turn out that she’s not in line with them.”

Worked like a charm, at least so far. A similar dynamic played out when Kathryn Bigelow directed Zero Dark Thirty and last year when Ava DuVernay directed Selma. It’s apparently a lot easier to try to undermine someone’s integrity when a woman is in the driver’s seat. The idea that these female directors were irresponsible with their message orignated from the left. Martin Sheen and Ed Asner with Zero Dark Thirty and various journalists attacking Selma. The debate over torture rages on but the so-called Selma scandal was a joke. Doesn’t matter because perception is everything, at the Oscars, in politics and especially during presidential elections.

Voting for the winners – the eternal dilemma of whether to vote with your heart or vote for the winner

Academy voters are always conflicted about whether to vote for a film that has no chance of winning or whether to vote for one of the two or three films that really have a chance. Does your vote count if it’s thrown away just because you voted with your heart? Idealists would say yes. Vote how you want or else the entire system of voting is pointless. While I can’t render an opinion on what Academy members should do (though I would hope their decision goes beyond what they merely “like”), it’s a certainty that elections are always won by those who turn out to vote at all. With the Academy, that means they should at the very least see all of the films. They traditionally have a pretty high turnout when it comes to voting. Unlike many other Americans, Oscar voters know their ballot is a privilege.

Where Americans at large are concerned, things get trickier. Only a little over 50% of the voting age population even votes at all. An estimated 93 million eligible voters dfailed to show up at the ballot booth in 2012. Most of the people who do vote do so because they feel personally invested in something. They care about something. The rest of them dwell in apathy. They’ve checked out of the system because they either think the system is rigged or they don’t think their vote will count. Idealists would tell you that their votes DO count, especially if everyone was required to vote as part of their citizenship. Anyone who has watched the presidential election for several decades might tell you that you should throw your vote behind the one who can win or else risk losing.

Once the Producers Guild announces their winner, the DGA and SAG follow suit — the cumulative weight of those kinds of numbers in the thousands cannot be shaken up with one or two votes here or there. It has become a massive, unshakable consensus since the Academy expanded their Best Picture contenders from five to more than five. The PGA mostly decides Best Picture now.

We’re lucky that in America we have a choice whether or not to vote. We’re lucky we have so many wonderful films to see every year. But the Oscars, like American politics, tend to make the race towards the winner about one or two choices rather than a multitude. I fear that this year the Democrats have already lost the election before we even get started. At the same time I don’t want to disillusion potential young people who are fired up to vote, even if they are ultimately voting for someone who can’t win.

I don’t think any one president can change this country into a liberal utopia. It’s just not possible under the current structure on Capitol Hill, riddled with systemic bureaucratic malady. For me, the choice is clear and the reason why was made crystal clear last month: it’s the Supreme Court, stupid.

What a shame to see The Dissolve close its doors. It was always my go-to site for people who asked me where to find good film writing online. It was dedicated to the practice of film criticism, had an engaging community and was not intolerable because of its ad content. Still, it’s hard out there for a pimp. I’ve been online for going on 17 years (kill me now) and I probably would not be here if I hadn’t worked for free for the first five years or so. It takes time for a site to really generate the kind of hardcore traffic needed to survive. I feel like The Dissolve was just hitting its stride in terms of reach. Still, it’s a traffic-driven business and unless you want to sell out your content for clickbait crapola it’s harder and harder to compete. What a shame.

This, on the heels of Kris Tapley’s In Contention leaving Hitfix.com. I can tell you with a fair amount of certainty that, except for the occasional Drew McWeeny review here or there I personally will never visit that site. Like The Dissolve, Tapley classed up the joint with his refusal to play the clickbait game, a practice which is destroying the internet.

A hat tip and a round of applause of The Dissolve — a brilliant concept, a beautiful thing.

Dustin Hoffman was interviewed and quoted in the Guardian with a juicy pullquote that film is the worst it’s ever been. Here is what he said:

“I think right now television is the best that it’s ever been,” he said. “And I think that it’s the worst that film has ever been – in the 50 years that I’ve been doing it, it’s the worst.”

The article continues:

The actor and director lamented changes to shooting schedules due to advances in digital technology, which mean that directors can be pressured to finish movies in three weeks or less.

“It’s hard to believe you can do good work for the little amount of money these days,” he said. “We did The Graduate and that film still sustains, it had a wonderful script that they spent three years on, and an exceptional director with an exceptional cast and crew, but it was a small movie, four walls and actors, that is all, and yet it was 100 days of shooting.”

Hoffman is clearly talking about studio movies and probably we can all agree that his statement reflects that reality. Lynda Obst wrote about it in her book on how Hollywood is changing and in it she referred to the way things are done now as “the new normal.” That is, tent poles rule the day, especially if they play in China, South Korea and India. Your perfect model for this is Jurassic World, which itself comes from the Spielberg original.

Many critics took to Twitter to disagree with Hoffman, citing the exploding world of independent film, and films made in countries all over the world that have nothing to do with America’s studio system. What’s happening, I think, is that actors are becoming less the focus in film as productions move more towards effects-driven and concept driven tentpoles. You see the best actors working on Lifetime movies, for instance, and you see their once promising trajectories redirected into the superhero genre where they often have to wear a ridiculous costume just to “stay relevant.” When I came of age, actors drove projects. Now, not so much. Just look at how interchangeable Spider-Man has become. Does it even matter anymore who’s in the suit?

In terms of the Academy’s perspective, how Dustin Hoffman thinks matters. The Academy continue to maintain old school values and will for quite some time with small changes made here or there in terms of diversity. They are mostly actors, thus they will always go for the actor driven entertainment. The directors and the writers also seem to like organic product. The technical categories can continue to follow, and even thrive on, the trends.

It will be interesting going forward to see where the Oscars themselves end up ten years from now, if we’re all still here. Will they have become Oscar Island to the extreme, where the only films they vote on are those made specifically for them? Will their tastes stay sequestered from the taste of the public at large, including the ever-growing millennial population? We’ll have to wait and see.

As to the question are there movies made now as good as The Graduate? That good? I don’t know. You really could ask the same question about modern art and literature I suppose. Will there ever be anything as good as Picasso’s Guernica? It’s hard to tell what movies stand the test of time but we do know that The Graduate was a major influencer on the films and filmmakers to come. In its own way, so was Steven Spielberg’s Jaws. It is lauded as a masterpiece and a classic now but it helped launched the film industry the way it is today.

Have any films recently landed with the same kind of culture quake as The Graduate where they altered not just film but how people thought of themselves in the world, hitting a cultural movement exactly at the right time? So many films made now take place in the past, those that end up in the Oscar race anyway. It seems as though filmmakers are afraid to confront the present because the past is so much easier to manage.

Some of the films that feel like culture quakes to me would include: Fight Club, The Social Network, Wolf of Wall Street, Mean Girls, Blue Velvet/Mulholland Drive, Pulp Fiction…

I went over to The Dissolve to check out their top 50 films of the past 10 years to find any that held to the requirements of The Graduate – 1) took place in modern times and addressed modern concerns, and 2) was good enough to stand the test of time. Social Network was Number 3 — to me it would easily be number 1, obviously. But their top 3 is pretty good:

1) Boyhood
2) Her
3) Social Network

These are decidedly white male perspective movies — two out of three of them are happy ending movies, with only Social Network really having that kind of ambiguous, troubling ending that The Graduate had. So I guess in the end I have to agree with Dustin Hoffman, while tipping my hat to the filmmakers out there who are still making movies, whether they reach the heights of The Graduate or not.

The documentary category is, once again, filling up quickly. Five slots really can’t possibly account for the abundance of documentaries, most of which are better than the feature submissions in any given year. Look at the overwhelming number of great titles from last year alone. While it dilutes the excitement and prestige of the awards to have more than five nominees in any category, it also is not a good way of honoring the documentary movement, which has been exploding in recent years.

Nonetheless, three strong contenders for the category have been directed by women and could make this a record-breaking year for women directors nominated in that category. Debra Granik’s critically acclaimed follow-up to Winter’s Bone, Stray Dog, Liz Garbus’ heartbreaking look at Nina Simone’s life in What Happened, Miss Simone, currently streaming on Netflix, and The Wolfpack, directed by Crystal Moselle about a group of boys who grew up in a restricted environment where their only outlet was movies. All three films paint dramatically different stories of American life and have all received rave reviews so far.

Stray Dog looks at a Vietnam war vet who runs a trailer park in rural Missouri. His new wife emigrated from Mexico and the two caravan with other vets on an annual pilgrimage to the Vietnam memorial in DC.

The international trailer for Snowden has just been released. The film stars Joseph Gordon Levitt playing the former C.I.A employee who leaked classified NSA information.

We don’t get to see any cast members in the teaser trailer, but the music and the tagline alone sets the tone for what’s set to be a tense drama. “One Nation under surveillance, for liberty and justice for all”

Here’s your first look at the proton pack which Melissa McCarthy,Kate McKinnon, Kristin Wiig and Leslie Jones will be using in the film. The teaser photo follows an earlier post where Feig teased outfits:

Pixar’s new movie, Inside Out made $91 million at the box office this weekend, taking a chomp out of Jurassic World’s second frame. The box office is the second biggest opening for Pixar behind Toy Story 3.

With Dolby Vision and Dolby Atmos, Inside Out becomes a deeply saturated world with brightly colored orbs and specks of dust breezing through the mind within a Dolby Cinema soundscape. Jonas Rivera, Producer of Inside Out, describes the experience, “Dolby Cinema allows us as filmmakers to present the film to the audience in its purest form…you’re getting the movie as close to the audience as you possibly can—they’re hearing and seeing it the way we see it in our heads.”

Check out this behind the scenes video as Director Pete Docter, Producer Jonas Rivera and Post Production supervisor Paul Cichoki give us insight into the deeply saturated and sharply contrasted color palettes graded with Dolby Vision and the subtle ambiance in a soundtrack mixed with Dolby Atmos that pull the audience into the film.

Kids are mean. Anthony Breznican reminds you just how mean they can be with his debut novel, Brutal Youth.

Set in Pittsburgh, 1991, before the dawn of social media, Brutal Youth is alluring from cover to cover as it plunges the reader right into the hell that is St. Michael’s Catholic High School.

Hazing — bullying’s sweeter sister — is a long tradition at the financially troubled St. Michael’s. It’s a decrepit school, its enrollment is on the decline and so is its reputation.

Peter Davidek attends St. Michael’s open day only to be greeted by a student on the roof. Noah Stein is a troubled boy haunted by his childhood, and Lorelei Paskal just wants to be popular.

They are all freshmen at St. Michael’s and are inevitably introduced to the hazing ritual that goes on at the school. Don’t be fooled, the hazing at St. Michael’s isn’t sugarcoated with innocent pranks or teasing. It’s full on brutal abuse, both verbal and physical.

The brutal bullying is seemingly tolerated by the teachers, and the bitter school counselor because it “promotes bonding”.

The goal for Peter, Noah and Lorelei is to survive their freshman year. The trio form an unlikely alliance in an attempt to end the hazing ritual, but the adults in charge don’t offer much solace. St. Michael’s priest, Father Mercedes, turns a blind eye because he has his own ulterior motives.

From his explosive prologue to his powerful last page, Anthony Breznican delivers a truly fascinating and gripping read. Revealing any more details could potentially spoil the unpredictable story. It checks all the right marks to make this a perfect 5-star read.

Brutal Youth is filled with well-developed and unforgettable characters. We discover many of the teachers have lives as intriguing as those of their students, as we are drawn into the twisted thoughts and feelings of St. Michael’s staff. Even the most menacing of characters are presented with a depth that explains their motives, as Breznican reminds us that everyone has their reasons.

Brutal Youth flows, sucking you in with a crisp narrative that is filled with unexpected twists and turns and is one of those books that you never want to end.

Breznican raises thought-provoking questions about hazing, bullying and the consequences of that behavior in a time when cellphones weren’t on school playgrounds and social media bullying did not yet exist.

Brutal Youth screams movie all over it, and that’s not a bad thing. The vivid detail and emotional attachment you feel toward all the characters would make for a perfect film.

If you’ve ever wanted to go back to High School…think again.

* * *

Anthony Breznican was born and raised in Pennsylvania. He has worked for USA Today and the Associated Press and currently is a senior writer at Entertainment Weekly. This is his first novel.

The poster for Johnny Depp’s Black Mass film has arrived. Based on the true life story of James ‘Whitey’ Bulger, Depp plays one of the most notorious gangsters in U.S. history.

In 1970s South Boston, FBI Agent John Connolly (Joel Edgerton) persuades Irish mobster James “Whitey” Bulger (Johnny Depp) to collaborate with the FBI and eliminate a common enemy, the Italian mob. The drama tells the true story of this alliance, spiraled out of control, allowing Whitey to evade law enforcement, consolidate power, and become one of the most ruthless and powerful gangsters in Boston history.

This is the live action movie based on the John Krakauer novel Into Thin Air, which is a must-read. I’m not sure why the IMDb doesn’t have Into Thin Air on the credits but the names are the same and they’re climbing Everest so how different can it can be? If told right, Everest should be a story of human folly, or human arrogance in thinking paying $50,000 and hiring sherpas will be enough to get one safely up that mountain but more importantly back down it. Into Thin Air is about how a few crucial mistakes lead to the (then) most deadly season on the mighty peak. Obviously the recent earthquake in Nepal obliterated that record. Everest, I hope, makes mention of what nasty and unforgivable human footprint has done up there, not just in the continual exploitation of the sherpas but the human waste left behind.

When a globe-hopping espionage trailer drops at 3 a.m. we might wonder whether it’s meant to feel clandestine or simply a self-aware admission that a movie like Mission: Impossible Rogue Nation knows no boundaries and abides by no time zones. Ordinarily I might not jump up to post a trailer in the wee hours, but I’m always glad to pay down my debt to Paramount for giving us the likes of Chinatown and The Godfather, Vertigo and Sunset Blvd. Not as if this or any other summer juggernaut needs our help, but I’d hate to think a few hours neglect would cut into the 50 million tickets this is bound to sell. Directed by Christopher McQuarrie who did _____, _____, and _____. [sorry, redacted. I’m paying down my debt to McQuarrie, too, for giving us The Usual Suspects.] Opens July 31, coincidentally landing smack dab in the middle of the mishigas when boys in corner offices whip out their tentpoles for comparison; when box-office chaos reigns and the more CGI mayhem that rains down, the better. Sure, I’m kidding around, but if you’re feeling ambivalent then truly the only thing you need to know to motivate you and 11 of your best buddies to go see Mission: Impossible Rogue Nation is that it was shot by Robert Elswit, a guy who rarely signs up for a bad movie, at least not since _____. [sorry, redacted.]

Laurent Durieux was chosen as Telluride’s poster artist. “Laurent Durieux was born in 1970 in Waterloo, 20 km from Brussels in Belgium. Laurent has been an illustrator and a graphic designer for over 20 years, and when he doesn’t teach graphic design, he spends most of his time creating posters for movies, old and recent. In 2010 he directed his first short animated movie titled HELLVILLE for Canal+ France produced by renowned French director Jean-Jacques Beineix (Betty Blue, Diva, IP5). Laurent has since taken part in many shows in Belgium, France and in the USA. Laurent’s posters can be found in several prestigious cinema related institutions such as the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences in Hollywood or the Cinémathèque Française in Paris, France as well as many worldwide private collections. After his first retrospective exhibition in France last year, Laurent has been invited to present his work in an individual exhibition, which will be held at the Cultural Centre De Warande in Turnhout, Belgium this June 2015.”